


It's a Jungle Out There

by JewelsFern



Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, F/M, Friendship, High School, Highschoolstuck, beta kids - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 22:25:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/931774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JewelsFern/pseuds/JewelsFern
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jade Harley is entering school for the first time after all her years of backwards homeschooling and hunting trips with her dear grandfather.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>This story follows the growing friendship between Jade, John, Rose, and Dave. Eventually there may be some Davejade and Johnrose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's a Jungle Out There

Jade Harley is entering her school for the first time when it’s in session. It’s loud and she cringes as she makes her way to her locker. Her unruly black hair cascades past her lower back and she pushes her long bangs off of her large circular glasses only for them to fall back. She wears a simple t-shirt with the image of a green atom on it and one of her long skirts with her sneakers. Her fingers are adorned with colorful threads that serve as reminders.

Jade had come here with her grandfather last week to get a tour and explanation of how things worked here. She was thankful for the principal’s kindness especially considering that her education background was very unconventional. Her grandfather was a big hunter when she was younger so they were always on a trip. She got home schooled because of this but her grandfather based his classes on what she put her interests in. The girl is a wiz at sciences but couldn’t tell anyone what the symbolism in a story is. Her grandfather had a way of getting around obstacles though.

The school seems a lot different when there is a load of kids there. Luckily no group decided to form around Jade’s locker. She expects cliques, she isn’t dumb, but isn’t worried about finding a group to hang around. Plus she has a relative here, although she doesn’t know who it is or how they are related. She just took her grandfather’s word for it. They’ve never spoken so they probably don’t even know she’s enrolled there.

She consults her planner for her locker combination, unable to remember what the assigned band on her finger represented, and reminds herself to memorize it.

She’s closing the door when a tone plays through the speakers. It is moderately pitched and solid, lasting several seconds. Students get up from their seats, waving or walking off with one another.

Jade twists to glance around. That wasn’t a bell. She doesn’t know what’s happening. Apparently it shows because a young man walks towards her, panic in his eyes.

“You can’t just stand there!” he gestures around, black hair messily falling back into its strange angles, “those sirens mean that you need to get low. We’re being attacked. Gangs y’know.”

Jade’s green eyes widen. She wasn’t aware that the school was in gang territory. The bucktoothed boy has already run off when she reaches for her rifle.

Except there is no gun.

Curse this school; she could have saved everyone. She grips her planner and makes a break for her first class. The classroom would be safe right? She’s checking her handmade map in her book as she turns a corner.

“No running in the hallway,” an elderly woman growls from a doorway, causing Jade to slow.

“But the gangs!” she nearly screams. It’s not safe here!

Realization hits her like an elephant stampede as confusion sweeps over the woman’s face.

She was tricked.

“I’m sorry, I was confused,” Jade says to the teacher quietly as she walks away, feeling her cheeks heat up as the last of the students mosey into their rooms, giggling.

Finally she finds her Geography room, trudging through the open door to find the only seats are in the middle of the room. She takes a seat as the tone repeats itself through the school.

It was supposed to be a bell.

 

Geography goes fairly well; the teacher, Mr. Mervosh, just handed out books and gave them the rundown of what they would cover. Jade’s heard about a lot of it before from her grandfather. Next she enters speech, noting no familiar faces from her last class. This was the only class she could get into even with it being a sophomore class.

More books are handed out. Jade ponders if she’s allowed to carry a bag tomorrow. The teacher, Mr. Wagner, seems pretty chill, sitting on his desk and gesturing about as he tells a story from his summer. One story melds into another and before Jade knows it she’s heading out to find another room.

Biology. A class seating chart is already projected onto the white board so she takes her place next to one Dave Strider, a blonde boy wearing sunglasses. Are you even allowed to wear those? The lack of teachers asking him to remove them says yes.

“Hi,” Jade says maybe too cheerily. He turns to her, not taking his chin from its resting spot on his palm.

“Hey,” he turns back to the front of the room, his facial expression unchanged. Jade shrugs it off; maybe a morning class on the first day of school isn’t the place to make friends. 

She sighs out loud at the realization that she’s been telling herself the same thing all morning. Jade sets out to connect the names on the board to the faces in the room, knowing that she wouldn’t remember most of them wouldn’t anyway. She stops when her eyes connect with the blue eyes of a dark-haired boy. John Egbert. The prankster from this morning. He waves with a grin as a girl with short blonde hair claims her spot beside him and opens a book to read.

“Hey,” he pauses and looks at the board before turning back to her, “Jade! I see you survived your first turf war!”

Jade glares at him. He was the boy that caused her to make a fool out of herself this morning. People saw that. Maybe that’s why no one wants to be friends with the freaky jungle girl. As she gets angrier at the boy, her face gets pink and her fists clench. His face goes from amused to worried in less than a second.

“Hey, it was a joke. No hard feelings, okay?” he forces out a chuckle. She must look like she’s about to cry or kill him because he’s shifting uncomfortably in his seat. The second bell has already rang but the lack of teacher allows the kids to keep talking. John sighs inwardly as an adult, Mr. Newman, enters the room sets a stack of papers on his desk.

Jade avoids contact with John the rest of the hour. Another book is added to her pile. The teacher allows the students to talk the rest of the hour but she sits in silence, mulling over the day’s events and doodling in the back of her planner. She’s not sure if Dave is even awake under those shades. John keeps glancing back to her; The girl behind him continues reading. Everyone else is loud. Jade misses the quiet of her grandfather’s house and RV and tent and anything she’s experienced except being here.

The bell ringing, well not ringing, shakes her from her sulking and she lifts the books and hurries to band. 

She was really excited to join band. Her grandfather had a flute around her entire life but neither of them knew how to play it. Except now she was going to learn. She knows how to play the bass guitar so sheet music isn’t new to her. Unless you want to speak about what the notes are technically. Or how her fingers go on the instrument’s holes. Or how to even put the thing together.

She brought the flute over to the school during her visit and her grandfather paid a hefty price to ensure the instrument would be ready for her. She watches the other students put down their books on a long counter against a wall and then get their cases from the shelves. Following suit, Jade goes to her lime green case and smiles to herself. Her grandfather did like to spoil her sometimes. The teacher, Ms. Powers, floats around the room directing everybody to their newly assigned seats. She smiles at Jade.

“Pretty case,” she says and leads Jade to a chair at the right of the room. Sheet music is already on the stand in front of her seat.

“Thanks!” Jade grins. The teacher smiles and heads back to assist other students. The other students are putting their instruments together so she opens her case and tries to understand what she’s supposed to do. Someone sits beside her, instantly opening his case and grabbing two of the pieces, putting them together. Dave Strider. Jade is surprised; this cool and quiet kid playing a flute? She watches him carefully and copies how he put his flute together. Step one down. Dave pulls the flute up and blows into it. 

 

Jade now feels like it suits him. His movements are graceful, his fingers instinctively moving to their places as he tunes the flute. The room is very loud for the first minutes before Ms. Powers catches their attention by hitting a small plastic tube against the podium, producing a low and hollow sound.

“Let’s start out with tuning and then a quick sight read,” she explains. She goes around the room telling each group what note to play. Jade only catches that she’s saying letters. Now she feels nervous. She lays the flute on her lap as she opens the beginner’s guide to playing the flute that was next to the sheet music on the stand. Yes, the fingering chart! She calms now as the woman approaches.

“C,” she says and Jade blows into the flute. It squeaks before becoming silent amidst the other flutes. Jade winces, pulling the instrument from her lips, and glances to see people staring at her. Dave raises his eyebrow slightly. The teacher nods to herself knowingly as she tells some people to pull out a little more before moving on.

Jade doesn’t play during the sight reading. She’s grown tired of today already and now just struggles to get her fingers in the right places at the right times. She often doesn’t get it. Eventually the class puts away their instruments and talk for the remainder of the hour.

“You ever play an instrument before,” the band teacher asks.

“Yeah. Bass Guitar,” Jade nods.

“Would you like some after class lessons for the flute? It’s quite a bit different from bass,” she offers, taking Jade’s tired grin as an answer. “Do you have to be anywhere after school?”

“No. I walk home so I’ll just call my grandpa and let him know!” Jade says, grinning. The bell rings and she waves as she goes to find her locker to get her lunch. She manages to get all her books put away and get her sandwich and a juice out.

“Hey, jungle girl!” someone’s behind her and Jade has to fight her normal reflex.

“Hi,” she turns to find herself face to face with a beautiful girl with straight brown hair that ends at her collar bone. She has green eyes and is wearing a red tank top under a black vest and jeans.

“So do you really come from the jungle,” she gets into her locker. She is just a few feet away from Jade’s own locker.

“Not really. I’ve been in a jungle but I didn’t live in one. Heck I’ve never really lived in one place before.”

“Oh. So you’ve just gotten to wander around the world your whole life,” she seems bored of Jade now, placing a hand on her hip as she shuts her locker.

“Well, I guess. I kind of just went with my grandpa to where he wanted to go.”

There’s silence for a moment before the girl says, “Well I’ve gotta go talk with some friends. See you around.”

Jade waves as she walks off, feeling as if that could have gone better. She finds an empty table to compose herself at. The amount of people in one place is overwhelming. She glances around and turns back to find John sitting across from her. She hadn’t even noticed; it was like he was just air.

“Hey, Jade!” He grins.

Jade doesn’t know whether or not she wants to hit him or just walk away from him. She settles on the second one, not wanting to get in trouble on her first day.

“Hey, wait, Jade. I’m really sorry about this morning. I didn’t know you were the jungle girl,” he’s following her.

“Don’t call me jungle girl!” she hisses, turning on her heel to glare at him. He stops, throwing his hands up in a fake surrender.

“How about I give you a tour or something. To make up for this morning.”

Jade glances over him one more time, reminding herself that she has the map she made so she doesn’t need him. Maybe this could get him off of her back though.

“Fine.”

After Jade has finished eating she allows John to lead her around the school. She sees the girl from earlier and John must have noticed her staring at the girl with a table full of friends.

“That’s Jennifer. Drama basically follows her around,” he explains. Jade raises her eyebrow. Maybe this tour is useful after all. He’s listing off what he knows about the people they pass as they make their way to the library.

“And that’s Rose. She practically lives in there,” he says, looking at the blonde girl from her other class. “Her mom is rich or something. Everyone calls Rose a goth because of her lipstick but she’s been pretty nice to me any time we talked.” Jade nods as John continues walking, waving to Rose just in case she noticed them. She didn’t. She continues to write in a notebook as they walk down the hall.

“Tell me about Dave Strider,” Jade says, glancing out a window and seeing the blond boy on a bench outside listening to music.

“He tries way too hard to be cool all the time. He thinks he’s some master or irony or some dumb shit. Apparently irony is cool or something and his dumb pointy anime shades are the epitome of irony because I’ve never seen him without them.”

“He plays the flute.”

“Must be ironic,” John shrugs. Jade laughs at this thought.

“I don’t want to kick you over this morning anymore, I guess,” Jade finally says as they wander more, “If you don’t take advantage of my lack of experience in these settings again I might forgive you.”

“I guess I won’t tell you lies about what’s going on again,” John fake whines, “I’m throwing some good pranks out the window.”

“What’s your next class,” Jade asks.

“English 1. I’d bet you’re also going there right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well we’re almost there so when the bell rings get a window seat.”

“Definitely. I’m getting tired of all these walls and ceilings. I miss the open outdoors,” Jade laughs.

“And I get tired of all this learning crap,” John adds.

 

The bell rings and Jade gets the second row window seat and watches as other freshmen enter. John sits behind her and she hopes that he doesn’t do anything to her back. She sees some familiar faces. Rose. Dave. Jennifer. The teacher begins quickly, not waiting for any stragglers in the hallways.

Rose is paying attention. Maybe she just finished her book. Mrs. Summers is going over what full books they will read as a class, the corners of her lips curling up in what Jade is sure a sincere smile.

Jade loves it when people are happy. She feels content when other people are content. As the woman in the front of the class seemed genuinely excited about the class Jade began to feel excited for it as well.

“Let’s just fit in a quick ice breaker,” she hands out children’s books out to a few people and dictates them into groups of four. Jade ends up with John, Rose, and Dave.

“Now I’m going to give you a few children’s books and I want you to make up titles based on just the covers. Just put your names at the top. We won’t be sharing these.”

Jade looks at the books. All the words have been covered with ripped up sticky notes. She sees the picture of some wizard on one the covers.

Rose is getting out a piece of paper and writing names in the top right corner. She looks up to Jade, “I don’t believe we’ve met before,” she says and Jade thinks she is one of the most elegant people she’s ever met.

“Jade Harley,” she grins. Rose smiles and writes it down. Dave appears uninterested entirely with what the task is. John sits with his chin on his hand.

“What should we call it,” he asks. Rose doesn’t seem to appreciate the cover. Does she have something against wizards? Jade glances back over it. A wizard standing in a forest with a fairy. The fairy has a tiny golden crown lying on her pink locks of hair.

“Princess Sugarwing and Fizban the Fizzler’s quest through Shadow Forest.”

Dave would have said a title instantly but it took him a bit longer to clean it up. Princess Candyass and Fizdick the Fizzler’s Quest through the Atramentous Fucking Thicket probably wouldn’t go over well with Professor Icebreaker.

Jade wasn’t even aware that Dave had looked at the book; of course it is nearly impossible to notice anything through those shades. No one says anything as Rose writes it down.

John is sure that’s the stupidest thing he’s heard in his entire life. He considers calling Dave out on the lameness but there are more books and Dave has contributed something. Instead he pulls out the next book. This one has three characters on the front. They all appear to be angry with each other, crossing their arms and looking in different directions. The first one is an anthropomorphic rabbit in a pencil skirt suit and huge glasses that remind Jade of her own. She’s wearing high heels and holds a small notebook. The next character is a parrot. His beautiful feathers are covered in a t-shirt and jeans with a pair of sandals. The last character is a cat. She wears a casual dress and ballerina flats.

Jade kind of wants to read the book, the characters being anthropomorphic. She ponders what misunderstanding could have caused the rip in these character’s relationships.

“So what, furries fighting?” Dave deadpans.

“We are most likely supposed to assume that these characters are biologically anthropomorphic. Perhaps the deep seeded teachings of the animal kingdom are still in the back of all of their heads telling the cat to eat the rabbit and bird and the rabbit and bird to not trust a cat,” Rose says.

“Or maybe it’s a kid’s book about getting over an argument with the characters replaced with animals?” John says.

“Barbara, Peanut, and Felicia learn to get along?” Jade suggests, opting for giving the characters cute names and avoiding the topic of deep seeded animal racism instincts. Rose smiles lightly, writing the title down.

“Last one,” John flips to a book with a man in a safari suit with a black lab at his side. Jade smiles. It reminds her of her grandfather.

“Hass and Halley’s Jungle Adventure,” Jade says. “I mean if it’s okay with you guys,” she adds quickly.

Rose is in the middle of writing it down when the bell rings. Jade waves before heading to Algebra 1 where she gets another book and zones out completely. The bell rings and she enters the gym for P.E. John also has that class this hour.

“Hey John,” she hasn’t forgiven him completely but he’s familiar.

“Hey.”

Coach Cline arrives and splits them into two groups. He appears tired. Jade and John end up on opposite teams and Jade begins to worry about not knowing the rules of nearly any game. The other kids seem excited about the group of balls in the center of the gym.

“Alright, let’s just play dodgeball today. Bring in gym clothes by the end of next week,” the coach starts. The teams line up on opposite sides of the gym, Jade following suit. He blows his whistle and some people run out to grab balls before falling back. Next thing Jade knows, balls are being thrown; people dodge them. Sometimes they dodge comically, reminding Jade of intense action movies. She studies the game, noting that if the ball is caught, the person that threw it has to sit down. If you get hit you have to sit down. The people don’t cross the center line. She thinks she has it now, dipping out of the way of a speeding ball and grabbing one rolling away after bouncing off the wall.

There’s John.

He wasn’t completely forgiven. She rotates her shoulder before stepping out and bounding forward, her arm moving quickly as she releases the ball. Except it comes off wrong.

The worry of the throw being bad flies out of her head as it connects with John’s groin. He falls over instantly, rolling to face the wall. Everyone stops, turning from the cursing form to Jade as she straightens out of her throwing stance. She is greeted with eyes either full of fear or compliments on her arm. John hasn’t moved.

The whistle blows. “Alright we’re almost out of time anyway. Go sit down.” No one protests, taking another glance at Jade as they roll balls to a few people bagging them in the center of the gym. “Egbert, you okay?” He calls out getting a muffled “yeah” in response. Jade goes to him.

“It was the gang,” she says, trying to keep a straight face. He glares up at her. “Here,” she extends a hand and helps him up. John is half bent over.

“We’re even now right? No more crotch shots,” he groans as he straightens up and starts waddling to the bleachers.

“Until you decide to prank me again,” Jade assures.

He smiles lightly, sitting down, “I’ll just have to start wearing protection.” Jade nudges him lightly.

“Do you have a pesterchum?” Jade asks.

“Yeah, here do you have a piece of paper?” Jade hands him her planner and a pencil. He opens it, flipping past the map and to the doodle page, and writes something down. He hands it back to her. “So, where are you guys living?”

Jade pauses, “Uh, I’m not too sure. It’s about a ten minute walk to school and I think the place is pretty nice. It’s south of here, I think.”

“Oh I think I know that neighborhood,” he says as the bell rings. “See ya,” he waves as he leaves.

Jade is almost afraid to enter the fray of the hall crowd that ensues after the bell rang. She opts out of visiting her locker and heads straight to the band room, pulling out her phone and dialing her grandfather’s number.

“Hello?” the voice answers almost instantly. The deep sound is soothing to Jade.

“Hey grandpa, I have to stay a little late today. Is that okay?”

“Did something happen?”

“No. I’m just getting help with the flute,” Jade stops outside the door.

“Okay. Call me when you leave the school.”

“Okay. Bye!” Jade waits for him to answer before ending the call and walking into the room. Ms. Powers waves from her desk in the small office room.

“Jade, I really have to go do some errands. You should be able to come in tomorrow evening. Or you could practice with Dave,” she’s picked up her bag and started out of her office, letting the blond cool kid emerge before shutting and locking the door behind herself. “I’m really sorry!”

“Don’t worry about it! I’ll practice with Dave if he doesn’t mind staying.”

Dave shrugs.

“Okay, well, be good! Shut the lights off when you’re done,” she apologizes one more time before she’s out the door, leaving Dave and Jade alone.

**Author's Note:**

> So the thing is, my school was really (REALLY) small so I'm trying for a school of about 1413 kids so if you know anything about how schools function at that size it would be sweet if you could tell me some stories. OR if you play the flute and see anything really off about it please let me know.  
> Thanks for reading this!!!!


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